


our hands at night

by commodorecliche



Category: Shingeki no Kyojin | Attack on Titan
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, Alternate Universe - Ghost Hunters, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Budding Love, Childhood Friends, First Kiss, Friends to Lovers, Ghost Hunters, Holding Hands, Jean is a skeptic and Marco is a believer who likes to DIY his own ghost hunting equipment, Love Confessions, M/M, Mutual Pining, Paranormal, Paranormal Investigators, Phasmophobia, Spooky, They're dumb your honor, Urban Exploration, idiots to lovers, no betas we die like men, protecting each other
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2021-01-10
Updated: 2021-01-10
Packaged: 2021-03-14 06:27:27
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 8,889
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/28666218
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/commodorecliche/pseuds/commodorecliche
Summary: “You sure you’re okay?”“I dunno, man,” Jean starts, “Just thinking that… a lot of things could be down that hall. Lot of normal, not paranormal, things… I just…”Without thinking, Marco reaches down and clasps his hand around Jean’s.“Come on, tough guy,” Marco prods gently, giving Jean’s hand another squeeze, “thought you weren’t scared.”“I never claimed to not be scared of ax murderers, Marco.”“There’s no one here. Come on, we’ll just do a quick sweep down the hall with the EMF. If we get something, we’ll use the spirit box, then we go home.”Jean clenches his shut before releasing a long and exasperated sigh. He nods begrudgingly and places one hand flat against Marco’s chest. Marco tries to the jolt of heat that Jean’s touch sends coursing through his sternum.
Relationships: Marco Bott/Jean Kirstein
Comments: 6
Kudos: 37
Collections: JeanMarco Gift Exchange 2020





	our hands at night

**Author's Note:**

  * For [ZoeBug](https://archiveofourown.org/users/ZoeBug/gifts).



> This is for ZoeBug who wanted to see Jean and Marco as amateur teen ghost hunters with some slow-burning development of feelings!! It isn't set in the 90's but I hope you still like it!! I'm always a slut for ghosts, spooky shit, and friends to lover romances. I'm considering writing a NSFW companion piece to this in the future, too!

"all these ghosts come streaming down and sometimes I wish I had something else"

\- Richard Siken

**::**

“Jean?” Marco whispers urgently into the radio. He does his best to keep his voice low as he does so, careful not to upset anything that might be lingering around him. He glances frantically around the darkened, empty kitchen. “Jean, anything upstairs?” 

There is a long silence as Marco waits for Jean’s reply, but the reply doesn’t come. The open journal on the table in front of him remains blank and the spirit box in his hand gives him nothing but silence, and yet Marco can’t get rid of the horrid chill inching up his spine. Being alone here is dangerous. 

Above him, Marco can hear the faint _thump, thump, thump_ of footsteps. He can only pray to god that those are Jean’s steps. 

“Jean, goddamnit, where are you?” Marco hisses into the radio again. 

“I’m in the upstairs bedroom,” Jean’s voice crackles through the walkie-talkie. 

“Are you walking around up there?? I’m hearing footsteps.” 

“No, I’m-” Jean starts, but pauses, the uneasy, trembling squeak in his voice taking over him for a second, “No,” he says again, more calmly this time. “I’m just in the bedroom, but I’ve got EMF 5 from the hallway into the bedroom. Mark that and the footsteps in the log and get up here with the camera and the spirit box!” 

“Shit, coming, coming!” Marco replies. He rushes through the darkness towards the stairs, tripping and running into things in the pitch as he goes. He keeps trying the light switches and lamps littered around the farmhouse, but none of them appear to be working; the fuse box must have blown. Awkward and clumsy in his movements, Marco eventually makes his way upstairs and finds his friend huddled in the corner of the upstairs bedroom. He watches as Jean holds out the EMF, which is blazing with activity. 

“It’s going crazy in here. Use the box, use the box!” Jean orders him. 

Marco fumbles in his pocket, dropping the crucifix he’d brought in with them for protection as he tries to pull the spirit box out. 

“Any day now, Marco!” 

“I’m trying, I’m trying!” 

Marco gets a firm hand around the spirit box, holds it in front of him with a trembling hand, and clears his throat. 

“Ah, ahem, uh, Margaret Robinson, are you here?” 

The spirit box scans emptily through the stations, detecting nothing, while the EMF continues to rage. Marco tries again. 

“Margaret, do you want to talk to us?” 

The spirit box scans but says nothing. 

“Margaret Robinson, how did you die?” Marco asks, with more conviction this time, trying his best to not let his voice tremble. 

The spirit box scans for another moment, before settling on a station. It abruptly repeats:

_**“DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE. DIE.”** _

Jean, lacking any sense of his previous displays of strength and composure, moves to exit the bedroom as quickly as possible. 

“Welp, that’s enough enough for me, time to go!” He screeches, frantically leaving the bedroom and darting down the stairs towards the front door. Marco follows him as quickly as he can. 

“Wait, but we haven’t even set up the cameras for orbs!” 

“Fuck the orbs!”

As they pass through the entry hallway, the phone in the kitchen begins to ring, shrill and harsh. Marco pauses to look at it, camera at the ready, and determined suddenly to retrieve the the journal he had forgotten on the kitchen table. 

“Wait a sec!” Marco says and heads towards the kitchen. 

“Let’s GO, Marco!” Jean squeaks again, somehow with even more urgency than his previous demands. 

“I thought you weren’t freaked out by this shit.” 

“I’m _not_ , but it’s _time to go_.” 

“I just want to grab the journal!”

“Forget the journal! It’s a Jinn, the journal doesn’t ma- WAIT, NO, NONONONO, NOOOO, FUCK, AHHH!!!” 

“Jean?!” Marco asks, hearing his friend’s muffled distress from the other room, “JEAN!” 

Marco darts back into the entry hallway only to find Jean’s body lying prone and still on the floor, his life taken by the very ghost they'd been investigation. The front door, which was previously open, is now firmly closed. 

“Ah fuck. Nope. No, no, no, shit, shit, shitttttt,” Marco exclaims to himself, casually stepping over Jean’s corpse and opening the front door to flee to the safety of the trailer. 

He makes it back to the trailer on his own, notably without Jean or his corpse and he closes the door behind him with finality. He pulls out his log book and makes sure to note all the evidence they’d collected. At the bottom, where it asks for the type of ghost they had encountered, he jots down “Jinn”, just as Jean had exclaimed prior to his untimely end. 

And with that, the mission is complete. Marco suddenly apparates back into their base in front of the mission board, and in the next second, Jean’s character appears next to him, alive and well. 

“Thanks a lot, asshole, I was almost out! Also, _really_ nice touch just stepping over my corpse like that,” Jean chides. 

Marco can’t help the boisterous laugh that erupts from his chest. 

“You could have kept going without me, you didn’t have to wait for me!” 

“Well excuuuuuuse me, I thought you might need my help, mister Damsel in Distress.” 

Marco scoffs as he looks at his player rewards from the last mission. 

“Oh please, I wasn’t the one who died in there, tough guy.” 

“Only because you made me wait for you so you could grab the stupid journal!” Jean says, as his character awkwardly circle’s Marco’s in the base. 

“I didn’t make you do shit,” Marco replies through his own giggles. 

“I was right though, wasn’t I?” Jean asks, “It was a Jinn. So the _journal didn’t even matter_! I died for nothing!” 

Jean wanders over to the board and looks over his inventory. 

“Mannnn,” he groans, “I lost all my shit too.” 

Marco grunts. 

“Well, _I_ leveled up.” 

“No shit, jerk; you got out alive. You’re lucky I like you.” 

Marco scoffs. 

“Please, you _love_ me.” 

Jean groans, but doesn’t deny it. But the air between them is suddenly tense and heady, filled too full with the weight of what Marco has just said. Silence reigns between them for a few long moments, and Marco can’t help but wonder when exactly the silence between them became awkward the way it is now. Eventually, Marco clears his throat, just to break the quiet. 

“You wanna play another round? Try out the prison map?”

Jean pauses before letting out a soft ‘ehh’. 

“I dunno; the prison map is pretty huge for just the two of us. Might be good to call it a night. My roommates will probably be back soon anyway.” 

Marco doesn’t argue, but he can’t help but notice how much that sounds like an excuse. Jean’s never minded bothering his roommates before. He doesn’t press the matter. 

“Ah, ‘kay, guess you’re right… It’s just fun. I like the VR, it’s like getting to actually hang out together. I miss you man, it’s weird not like… living next door to each other anymore.” 

“Hey, you coulda had the shitty dorm experience like the rest of us freshmen, but noooo, you wanted an apartment.” 

“At least I get to jack off without _Chad From The Football Team_ walking in on me with my dick out.” 

“CAN YOU _NOT_ MAKE ME RELIVE THAT TRAUMA, BODT?” Jean screeches. 

“Oh to have been a fly on the wall.” 

“You’re a freak,” Jean says softly. If Marco pretends, he can almost imagine a hint of fondness lacing Jean’s tone, but knows, deep down, it’s just his imagination. 

“Alright, well, I’ll see you in class tomorrow.” 

“Kay, I’ll text you later.” 

And with that, Jean leaves the lobby. 

Marco turns around and stares at the now-empty Phasmophobia base and sighs. He exits the game and slips off his Oculus headset, resting it gently in its cradle on his desk. He checks the time on his desktop: it’s not even 8 o’clock yet. Marco threads one hand into his hair - flattened by the VR headset, and tousles it back to a style that resembles semi-acceptable. His breath ekes out of him low and slow as he stares at his empty apartment; loneliness creeps up on him with the quiet subtly of a freight train. 

Biting his lip, Marco meanders aimlessly around the apartment. Back in high school, if he wanted to see Jean, he could just run next door, climb up the side wall of the house and bust into his room. But now that he’s in his own apartment, with Jean on campus over two miles away, it’s not as easy and Jean’s absence is a heavy emptiness in his day to day life. 

It’s not like they’re _strangers_ though, Marco forcefully reminds himself. He sees Jean almost every day in class - they don’t have the same major, but Jean’s Computer Engineering major and Marco’s Computer Science major are similar enough that most of their classes overlap and likely will for a while. But this new, sudden distance between them is far too noticeable. 

He’d lived next door to Jean back in Trost since he was 10 years old… Had been friends with him since they were 12… Had been _best_ friends with him since they were 13… And he’d been sneaking over for secret hangouts almost every night since they were 14. And yet now, at 19 years old, living in a new city for university, in an apartment that’s all his own while his best friend lives on campus, the two miles between them feels like a million. Suddenly, his small, sparse apartment feels _wrong_ … and empty. 

Maybe he should’ve lived on campus, like Jean suggested. It was his mom who wanted him to have his own place - she was concerned that life on campus would be too distracting for him, too many parties or rowdy roommates. Plus, she had told him, an off-campus apartment was cheaper in the long-run than room and board costs at school. But Jean had offered to be his roommate if he'd wanted to live on campus, and Marco thinks that maybe he should’ve just taken Jean up on the offer and defied his mother’s wishes. 

Or maybe he should have offered to go in on an apartment together with Jean; they could’ve been roommates then, and his mom still would’ve been happy. Hell, even this tiny apartment has a second bedroom. Marco’s currently using it as a computer room, but he’d be more than happy to move his desk out if it meant Jean moving in, instead. 

No, Jean probably wouldn’t agree to that anyway. As strange as it might sound, Jean had _always_ been excited about the prospect of campus life - dorms, roommates, walking to classes, campus shenanigans, the whole shebang. He wouldn’t leave it just so he could hole up in an apartment with his childhood buddy. 

_Maybe in a couple years,_ Marco thinks to himself, _If we haven’t drifted apart by then._

Marco could slap himself for the thought. Of course they won’t drift apart, and to think so just because they're currently living a couple miles apart from each other is _ridiculous._

With a groan, he slips his phone out of his pocket and contemplates texting Jean. Instead, he opens his unread text from his mom, and replies to her questions about how his classes are going. With a small huff, Marco forces his phone back into his pocket before he convinces himself to text Jean. He doesn’t want to bother the guy; he’d seemed pretty eager to hop off their game earlier. He’s probably hanging out with his roommates or something. Marco doesn’t want to intrude. 

Marco plops himself down at his small kitchen table. On one side, he has a few textbooks and notebooks sprawled across the old wood surface; on the other side is an old 12-820 armband radio he’s been tinkering with. A sort of… DIY spirit box he’s been trying to build without much success. Normally, he would’ve run it over to Jean for help - Jean was the one with the brain for tinkering, much more so than Marco. Jean, ever the blustering skeptic, probably would have laughed and given him a hard time about it being a silly thing to mess with, but in the end he still would have helped him out. Marco doesn’t have enough fingers for the number of things he’s attempted to DIY that only were even _moderately_ successful because of Jean’s clever intervention. 

Marco misses that. 

He grumbles to himself and shakes his head, attempting to relieve himself of thoughts of Jean. Instead, he undoes the back of the radio and once again begins sorting through the wired connections on the radio’s interior. There are _supposed_ to be three grey wires near the red ones on the left side, the third of which should be the Mute Wire, which he needs to cut in order to get this damn thing functional. But instead, there are _two_ grey wires, a red wire, and a light blue wire to the left of the red wire. In theory, the light blue _could_ be the Mute Wire, but he can’t say for certain and Marco can’t reason which of the other wires it could possibly be. And so, with a quick “Fuck it” to himself, Marco snips the light blue wire and hopes for the best. 

He screws the back of radio into place and flips it on and attempts to sweep the stations. But to his disappointment, the device doesn’t begin to scan. Instead, it stays on one station, and then dies. 

“Ughhhhhhhh,” Marco growls, dropping the radio onto his kitchen table with a loud clatter. There’s a DIY EMF reader shoved to the back of his closet that’s just as disappointing and non-functional as this wannabe spirit box. He needs Jean’s help. 

But he isn’t going to call him. Nope. Not tonight. Jean said he would text, so Marco vows to wait for Jean’s text. 

**::**

Marco makes it one hour and seventeen minutes before he gives in and calls Jean like he'd sworn he wouldn't. It’s almost 9:30 now, and Jean, for one reason or another, isn’t answering his call. When Jean’s familiar voicemail - _It’s Jean, you know what to do_ \- sounds off in his ear, Marco hangs up with a disappointed sigh. 

“Must be busy with his roommates,” Marco says aloud as he sets his phone down on his desk, his tone wholly unconvincing, even to himself. Marco settles into his chair and pulls up Steam and browses some of the games for sale, looking for any new horror games that might catch his eye. But not two minutes later, his phone buzzes violently against the hardwood desk, and a video call prompt from Jean appears on Marco’s screen. 

Marco fumbles with his phone, almost dropping it as he scoops it up off the desk and answers Jean's call in a flurry. 

“Hey!” He says, a smile breaking across his face as he see Jean’s face grinning back at him. 

Jean has a towel in one hand that he’s using to dry his hair, and he is _noticeably_ shirtless. Marco’s face falters and his eyes widen at the sight, but he catches himself and recovers within an instant. All he can hope is that Jean didn't notice him gawking.

“Hey man,” Jean says, still toweling at his hair, “Sorry I missed your call earlier, I was in the shower.” 

“All good, all good,” Marco gulps around the lump in his throat. 

“What’s up?” 

“Oh ah, nothin’. Just was fucking with this 12-820 armband radio and couldn’t get it figured out.” 

Jean’s brow furrows. 

“Why were you- wait, hang on, I gotta set you down for a sec,” Jean says, setting his phone on his dorm desk. Marco watches as he walks towards his closet to dig out a shirt, “What were you messing with a radio for??” Jean calls out over his shoulder as he pulls a ratty band tee out of the closet. 

Marco watches with rapt attention as Jean yanks the old thing over his head, his lean back muscles flexing as he does so. Marco recognizes the shirt as soon Jean turns around - it’s an old Joy Division shirt of Marco’s dad that, for one reason or another, had been passed on to Marco. Jean had nixed it from Marco when they were kids - the shirt was way too big for either of them, but Jean swore he’d use it as a nightshirt. Marco recalls with fondness the number of times he’d broken into Jean’s bedroom window at night only to find him wearing that old Joy Division shirt and a pair of pyjama pants. 

It fits him well now, though it’s still a little big for his frame. 

“I said,” Jean says again as he strides back towards his desk, louder this time, “What are you messing with an old radio for?”

Marco realizes he’s been quiet too long and drags his attention away from Jean’s shirt, and back to the conversation. 

“Ah, you’ll laugh.” 

“Probably,” Jean tells him honestly, coming back to the desk and picking up his phone to hold it in front of his face again, “but you should tell me anyway.” 

“I’m trying to… DIY a spirit box.” 

Jean, as expected, laughs. 

“A spirit box?? Why?” 

Marco glares at him playfully - he’d expected this ribbing. Hell, he’d outright _missed_ it in the few hours since he and Jean had stopped playing Phasmophobia together. 

“To listen for spirits, _obviously_.” 

“Riiiiiiiiight… Where’re you gunna use it??” 

Marco shrugs. 

“Around town, I dunno…” 

Jean looks at him with wholly-expected skepticism. 

“Oh come on,” Marco defends, “It’s not like Jinae is short on haunted locations.” 

“ _Supposedly haunted_ ,” Jean corrects. 

“Haunted. This city’s old as balls, there’s history and hauntings out the ass here,” Marco corrects right back. 

Jean sighs with exaggerated faux-annoyance and drags his fingers through his still-drying hair. 

“Want me to take a look at the radio for you?” 

Marco beams, ready to say yes, until he remembers that he’d already killed the radio. 

“Er, well. Yeah. But we’ll probably need to try on the other one I have… I sort of… _broke_ the first one.” 

Jean closes his eyes and shakes his head, a large grin across his face. 

“You really shouldn’t be allowed around electronics. I fear for any computers you wind up working on in the future.” 

“Hey, they should be _honored_ to have me working on them.” 

Jean hand-waves that comment with a dismissive scoff. 

“So when should I come by?” 

“How about tonight?” Marco asks and tries not to sound too hopeful or eager.

“Well, you’ll have to pick me up… No car, remember?” 

“I don’t mind,” Marco says, a little too quickly. Jean seems to notice, but he doesn’t comment on it. Instead, he smiles and nods. 

“Alright, whenever you’re ready.” 

“Be by in 15!” 

**::**

“So what exactly makes a regular ol’ shitty radio into a _spirit box_?” Jean asks as they enter Marco’s apartment, making sure to emphasize the words “spirit box” with a spooky wiggle of his fingers. 

“Uh, not much really. It just needs to be able to scan radio frequencies un-muted and undeterred in order to pick up low grade EVP.” 

Jean nods and follows Marco towards his makeshift workstation at the kitchen table. 

“So you need the Mute Wire cut or something?” 

“Yeah!” Marco exclaims with a smile, “Exactly. See, look at that, you _are_ pretty smart, I don’t care what everybody says.”

“Oh, hardy-har-har.” 

Jean picks up the dead radio on the table. 

“So how did you brutally murder this one?” 

Marco grimaces, face flushing, and rubs the back of his neck in shame. 

“Cut the wrong wire.” 

Jean smirks at him. 

“Look,” Marco defends, “There were supposed to be three grey wires on the left, but it only had two, and then it had a weird light blue wire I’d never seen before, so I got a little cut-happy, okay?” 

“Well, here’s hoping your other radio is wired up normally.” 

**::**

It takes Jean about 30 minutes to get the back off the second radio and to find the correct wire. But once he has, he snips it without hesitation, and closes the radio back up and offers it to Marco. 

“Test it out, bud.” 

Marco smiles and takes the radio from him, pointedly ignoring the quiet way his and Jean’s fingertips brush as he does so. Their fingers have touched and brushed together more times than Marco can count over the almost-decade they’ve known each other; this shouldn’t be any more significant than those other times. And yet, in the quiet intimacy of Marco’s apartment, with his speaker playing some soft lofi from his bedroom, Marco cannot help but feel the heady weight that lingers in their every touch. 

“Thanks,” Marco breathes, swallowing around the thickness in his voice. He licks his lips and flicks the radio on. He sets it to scan and watches with ecstatic captivation as the machine begins to scan through the frequencies without inhibition or muting. A mix of static and garbled human voices spills from its speaker. 

Marco slaps Jean’s arm with enthusiasm. 

“Hot damn, I think you got it!” 

Jean grimaces at the things awful sounds. 

“ _That’s_ what it sounds like when it works?” 

“Yeah! If it picks up any EVP, it’ll sound a little more clear.” 

“I like the ones in Phasmophobia,” Jean tells him, taking the radio out of Marco’s hands and turning it off, “The ones that just tell you there’s nothing there instead of just constantly scanning and making god-awful noises when it doesn’t detect something.” 

“Actually,” Marco starts, allowing himself to set one gentle hand on Jean’s shoulder, “speaking of Phasmophobia; if you don’t mind, I’ve also got a home-grown EMF that could use checking out? I think one of the wires might be wonky, it seems to just go off at random whenever it’s on.” 

Jean scoffs. 

“Isn't that what _most_ EMF meters do?” 

“Oh, hush,” Marco chides with a pop on the back of Jean’s head, “You know, you act all big and tough now, but I’ve heard those high pitched screams you let out during our Phasmophobia missions. I bet if I took you somewhere to _actually_ do some ghost recon, you’d be a little scaredy-cat.” 

“Yeah, right.” 

“‘ _AHHH MARCO THE EMF IS GOING NUTS UP HERE AHHH’_ ’”, Marco mocks, mimicking Jean’s outbursts during their last round of Phasmophobia, “That ring a bell, blondie?” 

“Okay, you know what, you’re on,” Jean says with the sort of casual confidence that Marco wishes didn’t turn him on as much as it does, “Take me to a spooky place. We’ll do all your little readings and tests, and I'll bet you that _you_ get more freaked out by it than I do.” 

“Fine,” Marco smirks, “How about tonight?” 

Jean’s facade of confidence slips for a split second. 

“T-tonight?” Jean asks, hesitation now lacing his previously casual tone. He catches himself in the next second, however, and plasters a calm and cool look back onto his face, “I mean, yeah, tonight, that’s fine.” 

“Let me grab the EMF so you can get working on it while I figure out where to take your wimpy ass tonight.” 

Marco turns on his heel to head towards the spare bedroom, and Jean follows him. 

“Careful, mister, you’re slowly talking yourself out of having someone fix your wonky fake ghost detector.” 

Jean stays close on Marco’s heels as they head back to the second bedroom and into its closet. Jean meanders around the small room idly as Marco digs around for the DIY EMF he’d been working on a few weeks ago. Marco spares a glance back at his friend, watching as Jean eyes Marco’s desk and notices the framed picture that is sitting to the side of his computer. It’s a photo of himself and Jean embracing each other tightly; it was taken just after their high school graduation. Jean picks the frame up and inspects it closer. 

It’s one of Marco’s favorite pictures, though he’ll never tell Jean that. 

The two of them had just finished the graduation ceremony and had just finished saying goodbye to many of their friends for the summer, perhaps even forever, as they’d all be going off to different colleges. Jean and Marco’s families had planned for a big luncheon together after the ceremony, so the two of them wouldn’t be parting ways, and hell, they were going to the same school come fall. And yet still, after saying goodbye to their friend-group and removing their ceremonial robes, something about the moment felt final between them. It was the closing of a chapter, the end of major era of their life together. 

Jean had been the one to initiate their hug that day, his eyes red and wet as he'd drawn Marco in close and embraced him with bruising force. Marco’s mother had snapped the photo before either boy could object. If she’d taken it with an even slightly better camera, it might have been obvious in the picture that _both_ of them were crying in it. 

“I didn’t know you got prints of this picture,” Jean says, his voice soft and somewhat distant in a way that Marco can’t ignore. 

“Oh, uh, yeah. My mom was ordering some prints for a few pictures of hers and asked if I wanted anything, so I asked for that one.” 

Jean clears his throat and sets the picture frame back down the desk. 

“Did you just get one print or-” Jean trails off. 

Marco doesn’t look back at him, but instead continues to dig for the EMF as he tries to figure out whether Jean’s tone sounded hopeful or accusatory. 

“No, she got a few,” Marco tells him, “Why? Do you want one?” 

Marco prays that he doesn’t sound too hopeful in his question. 

Jean pauses for a moment, and then clears his throat again. 

“Yeah, if you have one.” 

Marco turns his head to the side to look back at Jean over his shoulder. 

“Sure thing.” 

Jean nods, and with that, the moment is gone. 

Marco turns back to the closet and pulls out the small, black bag holding the EMF from the very top shelf. He digs it out of the bag as he walks past Jean and out of the emotionally-charged spare bedroom, back towards the neutral space at the kitchen table. 

“I think it’s just a wire,” Marco says as he sets the meter on the table, “But I just don’t have the finesse to root around and figure out what’s fucked up. Maybe you can figure it out." 

Jean sits down in front of it and inspects the small device, eyes scanning over its sleek black surface and green, yellow, and red bulbs on the front. He looks up at Marco with wonder in his eyes. 

“You built this? From scratch?"

Marco nods, suddenly sheepish, and sits down in the chair next to Jean. 

"Pretty much."

“Dude, it looks awesome.” 

Marco blushes and waves his hand. 

“Yeah, well, wait till you open it up and look at the circuitry before you praise me, alright?” 

“I’m sure it’s fine, probably just something simple.” 

“Alright well… You get fixin’, I’ll find us somewhere to go tonight.” 

**::**

Marco goes over a few locations on his phone, while Jean fiddles with the interior circuitry of the EMF with focused concentration. Every few moments, Marco dares a quick look up at his friend to watch him as he works. Jean’s brow is furrowed and his tongue is poking out the side of his mouth as he inspects the circuits and wires with intention. Marco can’t help but smile as he watches him. He relaxes back into his chair a little more fully, his focus halfway on his phone, and halfway lingering on Jean’s face. If Jean notices the way Marco allows his leg to jut forward and press against his, he doesn’t comment on it. And Marco doesn’t pull away. 

“So,” Jean says after a few moments to disrupt the quiet. He doesn’t look up from the wires he’s tinkering with, however, “I thought this place was a one bedroom, but I guess it’s technically a two?” 

“Oh, yeah, the second bedroom is kinda small so I figured it was more of an office than a bedroom.” 

Jean doesn’t reply, but he nods solemnly, and doesn’t look up. 

“But uh,” Marco continues, filling the gap that Jean has left between them, “it _is_ a two bedroom, should anyone need or… _want_ a place to stay or something…” 

The unspoken invitation to Jean is there, hanging in the space between them, and Marco wonders if either of them will ever outwardly acknowledge it. 

For now, neither of them will.

“Think I got this fixed, looks like it just had a loose connection. Should be good now,” Jean says, changing the subject immediately, and the silent invitation of the empty second bedroom drops like a box of lead.

Marco tries to hide his disappointment, and plasters on a smile, as he takes the repaired EMF device from Jean. 

“Thanks,” Marco mumbles, before clearing his throat, “I think I found us a spot to check out.” 

“Oh?” 

“Yeah, there’s an abandoned elementary school about 15 minutes away. Super popular spot for urb-exers and ghost hunting crews. Wanna check it out, 'fraidy-cat?” 

“Oh, you’re on.” 

Marco stands and grabs his backpack from his bedroom. He empties out his school supplies and textbooks onto the kitchen table and replaces them with the freshly-repaired EMF reader and the spirit box. He brings along a notepad, his Maglite flashlight, a pocket knife, and his wallet and keys. 

“Alright, I’m good, you ready to go?” He asks Jean. 

“Shouldn’t we bring like… a smudge stick or-or a crucifix or something?” 

“Thought you didn’t believe in that stuff.” 

“I _don’t_ ,” he insists, “but they do it in the game and they do it on TV and shit, so I mean… Ugh, nevermind, forget it.” 

“Well, bad news, I don’t have either of those things.” 

“ _You_ don’t have a crucifix?” Jean asks with disbelief. 

“Just cause mom’s catholic doesn’t mean I am. You, of all people, should know _that_ , dude.” 

“No, I know, I just-” He pauses, “I figured your mom would’ve forced you to take one with you or something.” 

“Well, unless she snuck one somewhere in my luggage that I don’t know about, I don’t have one. Now come on, quit stalling. It’s getting late.” 

“Guess we’ll just die if a ghost comes up on us then,” Jean ribs, elbowing Marco as he walks past him and out the front door. 

“If memory serves,” Marco chides as they head down the stairs and into the parking lot, “ _you_ were the one to die in the last game, not me.” 

“Yeah, cause of you!!” 

“Just get in the car, Jean,” Marco laughs. 

“So,” Jean says, scrolling through Marco’s Spotify for something to listen as Marco drives them across town, “What’s the deal with this elementary school?”

“Ah, I didn’t read too much about it, but from what I saw it closed down 30 or 40 years ago because some teacher went nuts and killed some students.” 

Jean’s face curls in disgust. 

“Fun…” He chirps sarcastically. 

“On the bright side, at least we’ll get some interesting readings.” 

“Riiiiiiight.” 

**::**

They pull into the empty parking lot in front of the elementary school in relative silence. As soon as they park, Marco turns down the music and allows himself a moment to take in the foreboding sight of the building. It’s not a huge place - most elementary schools are small-ish buildings anyway - but it looks _dauntingly_ massive in the haunting moonlight of the midnight hours. Kudzu vines that look like black, sprawling tentacles in the darkness, have encased almost every viable exterior wall, busting through the windows and doors, creeping into the school like a parasite might invade a host. 

The walls that aren’t covered in foliage are cracked and decrepit, shattered by time, or sullied with black spots of mildew and moss that have built up over the years since its closure. The few windows that are intact reveal a pitch black interior, reflecting only the garish moonlight, its shimmer and shine hovering like ghosts atop the glass. 

The place looks positively _monstrous_. 

He and Jean stare at it for a long, heavy moment before Jean finally breaks the silence. 

“Oh, this place looks _great_.” 

“Psh,” Marco scoffs, “Thought you weren’t scared.” 

“Not of ghosts, but this looks like ax-murderer-central, if you ask me. Are you sure this is a good idea, Marco?” 

Marco, unthinking, rests his hand atop Jean’s leg and rubs it with calm reassurance. It’s only when he sees Jean’s pointed stare at his hand that Marco realizes what he’s done. He yanks his hand off Jean’s leg as if it burned him. He wasn’t supposed to do that. And yet, Marco can’t help but wonder when they got so awkward about touching each other. They never used to be uncomfortable about these things. How many times had they fallen asleep in each other’s bed’s as young teens after staying up too late watching movies? How many times had they curled up together on a couch as middle-schoolers to read or play Gameboy with nary a concept or concern for personal space? 

But now - 19 years old and living in an entirely different world than they grew up in - their touches seem _different,_ somehow. They seem foreign to him, frightening and new, even if they’ve felt each others bodies a hundred, a thousand, a million times before. But now… these sorts of touches aren't something two 19 year old men do, are they? Men don’t squeeze each other’s knees for reassurance, they don’t gently touch each other’s hands, they don’t hug each other weepingly at graduation. 

...Right?

_Maybe_ , Marco thinks to himself, _Maybe this is the natural outcome of a decade’s worth of packing loaded touches atop loaded touches_. 

Maybe this is the point in their lives when the touching becomes too much, when it becomes taboo. 

Maybe this is the point when they _both_ realize that all those previously innocent touches between them were never truly innocent. 

Marco presses his hand atop his own thigh, fingers curling and uncurling against the rough denim of jeans repeatedly in a poor attempt to ground himself. He clears his throat. 

“It’ll be fine,” Marco says, “don’t worry, there’s no one around for miles.” 

“ _That’s_ what worries me,” Jean tells him. 

“Does it make you feel any better if I tell you I’ve got a pocket knife?” Marco tries. 

“No!” 

“Well then, there’s just no pleasing you," Marco jokes, feeling the mood lighten around them. 

Jean groans and rolls his eyes. He gestures vaguely at the nightmare building in front of them. 

“Let’s just get this over with.” 

Marco nods and exits the car first, snagging his backpack out of the backseat as Jean loops around the car to stand next to him. Marco plops his bag on the roof of the car so he can sift through it and grab the items he needs. It doesn’t escape Marco’s attention, however, exactly how closely Jean is standing next to him - even before they’ve taken a single step towards the building. Jean leans back against the car and makes sure to press his shoulder firmly against Marco’s, their body heat mingling in the chilly winter air. 

“Do you want to hold the flashlight?” Marco asks, offering the heavy Maglite to Jean. 

Jean considers it, but then shakes his head ‘no’. 

“Nope, you take that. I’ll take the knife, though.” 

Marco smiles and nods. He can’t help but wonder if the only reason Jean is rejecting the flashlight is because having it would mean he'd have to step into the building first. 

“Of course.” Marco hands him the knife. “Just don’t go stabbing me in the back, alright?” 

“No guarantees.” 

“Can you take the EMF? Or would you rather have the spirit box?” 

“Eh…” Jean considers it for a moment, turning now to face Marco’s backpack that’s still sitting on the roof of the car. Marco notes, however, that he keeps their shoulders pressed together still. “I’ll take the EMF; you’re the spirit box guy, from what I’ve gathered playing Phasmophobia…” 

“No promises this thing even works…” Marco hums. 

Jean shrugs.

“Maybe it will.” 

Something cinches in Marco’s chest - that painful fondness rearing its ugly head, reminding him with horrible ferocity why he cares so much for Jean. Even in the face of everything Jean doesn’t believe in - ghosts, ghost hunting, the paranormal, in general - Jean _still_ believes in him. Jean still believes that the things Marco does and the things he creates have meaning and worth. Marco doesn’t know what to say to that, so instead, he simply turns to face Jean and smiles. 

Without thinking, he lifts his arm and lets his hand settle on the back on Jean’s neck. For just a moment, he wants to throw aside any stigmas they might have about touch, he wants to throw away any of the heaviness these moments might have, and he wants to revel in Jean’s closeness. And so, unthinking, he pulls Jean forward and presses their foreheads together without a word. 

Jean, for what it’s worth, doesn’t pull away. 

They’ll have to talk about this - Marco knows they will. They will have to talk about this forehead touch, about the leg touch. They'll have to talk about why Jean wants a copy of the picture on Marco’s desk, and about why Jean had seemed so focused earlier on Marco’s mostly-empty spare bedroom. But for now, they don’t need to talk about anything. For now, they have this moment, their foreheads pressed together, quietly breathing each other’s air in the cold Jinae evening. 

Marco allows his fingers to caress the spiky buzz of Jean’s undercut at his nape, savoring its prickly softness. He takes it in, just for a moment, before pulling away with a soft huff and nodding his readiness. 

“You good?” He whispers to Jean. 

Jean nods. 

“Y-yeah. Lead the way, kemosabe.” 

Marco locks the car, slings his bag over his shoulders, and gathers his items as Jean does the same. They head towards the front doors of the elementary school; there are chains donning the front doors, but the right door cracks open just enough for Marco and Jean to fit through, though Marco has to slip off his bag to fit. 

The two of them stumble inside with thunks of shoes and clangs of chains, the noise far too overbearing and obvious in the otherwise-silent school halls. Once inside, and once the noise has begun to settle behind them, Marco slips his bag back on and turns the flashlight on, shining it to the right, the left, and then straight ahead of them. There are hallways to the left and right, leading to corridors of presumed elementary classrooms, and there is an even longer corridor straight ahead, with a set of double doors at the back that Marco can only presume lead to the building’s gymnasium. 

Each corridor is littered with leaves, and dirt, and debris of all sorts, but the oppressive silence fills each hall like water, flooding each one from floor to ceiling with heavy foreboding. Behind him, Marco feels Jean’s hand grab ahold of the hem of his shirt for security. Despite the undeniable eeriness of the entire location, Marco can’t help but smile at the way Jean has reached out to him for safety.

“Which way do you wanna go?” Marco whispers. 

Jean takes a step closer to Marco. 

“Really don’t think it matters, bud.” 

“Right, right.” 

Marco swings the flashlight to the left, then to the right. 

“I dunno, how about to the right?” 

“S-sure,” Jean stutters, clinging fractionally more tightly to Marco’s shirt. 

“You got the EMF on?” 

“Uh,” Jean says, pausing for a moment. Marco can all but feel the hesitation in his body when he realizes he will have to let go of Marco’s shirt to turn the meter on. But after an extended few seconds, Jean finally releases his grip on Marco’s him and flicks the EMF reader to on. “Yeah, it’s up.” 

Within a second, Jean’s hand has returned to Marco’s shirt, clinging just as tightly as it was a moment before. 

“Hang on, I gotta get the spirit box ready to go. Not turning it on yet, just want it ready to scan.” 

“Sure, yeah, okay,” Jean says with fake-bravado that Marco can hear from a mile away. 

“You okay?”

“ _Peachy_! You?” 

“I’m okay.”

But even Marco has to admit, the idea of this place was much less frightening than the reality of it. Every corridor is an abyss of darkness and emptiness ahead of them, simultaneously a welcoming hearth into its blackness and a foreboding warning of its seeming danger. Suddenly, this entire thing doesn’t seem like a good idea, but Marco isn’t about to back down. 

Marco points the painfully bright Maglite down the right corridor and takes a step in its direction, and while Jean keeps his fingers firmly wrapped in Marco's shirt hem, he doesn't make a move to follow his friend towards the corridor. Marco pauses when he feels the tension on his shirt and turns back to face Jean. Jean drops Marco's shirt as Marco turns around and steps into his space. 

“You sure you’re okay?” Marco asks again, one hand rubbing Jean's bicep for reassurance. 

“I dunno, man,” Jean starts, “Just thinking that… a lot of things could be down that hall. A lot of _normal_ , dangerous, and not paranormal, things… I just…” 

Without thinking, Marco reaches down and clasps his hand around Jean’s. 

“Come on, tough guy,” Marco prods gently, giving Jean’s hand another squeeze, “thought you weren’t scared.” 

“I never claimed to not be scared of ax murderers, Marco.” 

“There’s no one here. It's just us. Come on, we’ll just do a quick sweep down the hall with the EMF. If we get something, we’ll use the spirit box, then we'll go home.” 

Jean clenches his shut before releasing a long and exasperated sigh. He nods begrudgingly and places one hand flat against Marco’s chest. Marco tries to the jolt of heat that Jean’s touch sends coursing through his sternum. 

“ _Fine_ , Jesus, let’s just do this before I change my mind.” 

Marco smiles and doesn’t let go of Jean’s hand. Instead, he turns back to face down the right corridor, keeping Jean’s hand wrapped up tightly in his own, and leads the way forward with whatever shreds of bravado he can muster. But, as much as Marco wants to pretend otherwise, even he can’t deny the empty, aching chill of this place. The hall, devoid of light and life, seems more like a tomb or a skeletal chamber, than a school - awful and foreboding, full of history that perhaps others weren't meant to know. And every inch he and Jean move forward into the foreboding corridor sends dread shivering up and down Marco’s spine. Whether there is something paranormal here or not seems irrelevant, at this point, because the power and terror this place seems to possess on its own is enough to send even the bravest running. 

Marco isn't all that brave, not really. At the moment, his only comfort is the firm and solid feeling of Jean’s hand cradled inside his own.

Most of the classroom doors along the hallway are closed, but a few stand open and dauntingly inviting, as if they were daring the two of them to enter. The blackness of the night hovers inside each room like ichor, weeping out of each door and into the hallway like purulent wounds. Marco, despite his previous confidence, doesn’t dare drag the two of them into any specific room. He opts instead for the relative safety and "comfort" of the hallway. 

They make it about halfway down the east corridor when suddenly, somewhere behind them, distant echoing footsteps begin to thump slowly across the floor of the west corridor. Both Jean and Marco spin around at the sound of them, staring down the path they’d just walked, looking for any possible source of the noise. 

_Thump, thump, thump_. Three solid steps sound out in the darkness, with no source to be found, until suddenly... 

They stop and dead silence resounds in their wake. 

Jean’s hand wriggles inside of Marco’s grip, until he eventually adjusts it so that their fingers are laced together. 

“You heard that, right?” Jean hisses, fingers intermittently squeezing and releasing, squeezing and releasing, Marco’s. It’s a strange reassurance, this feeling of Jean’s hand in his, this desperate grappling that Jean’s fingers are doing right now. Even in this horrifying moment, Jean's touch is comforting in a way that Marco can hardly articulate. 

“Yeah, I heard it.” 

“I got nothing on the fucking EMF but I say we leave like… _now,_ ” Jean insists. 

Marco turns his head to look behind him and back down the right corridor they’d just been traversing. All of a sudden, a door at the far end of the hall creaks ajar and opens on its own. Marco’s eyes go the size of saucers.

Fuck the EMF, fuck the spirit box, fuck getting pictures of anything, fuck exploring, fuck _all of this_. It’s time to go. 

“Uh, ahh-” Marco squeaks, his voice suddenly high-pitched and broken. He swallows and attempts to calm his voice so as not to frighten Jean, “Yeah, let’s go.” 

Jean doesn’t need to know about the door at the other end of the hallway, so Marco doesn’t tell him. 

Without another word, Marco pushes Jean forward towards the exit. Jean doesn't need any encouragement, he immediately picks up speed and starts to all but run towards the school exit, dragging Marco along behind him and refusing to let him go. As they near the exit, the footsteps resume. 

_Thump._

_Thump._

_Thump._

Louder now. 

_Closer_.

Marco doesn’t bother to look back into the building as the noise persists, gets louder, draws nearer. He pushes Jean through the halfway opened front doors, and wedges himself through right after him. Once the two of them are out of the building, Jean grabs Marco's hand again without a word and drags him down the front steps and across the parking lot towards the car. 

“Unlock it!” Jean shouts as they near the car, and Marco obeys, clumsily pulling his keys from his pocket and pressing the unlock button as many times as he can. The flashers on his car blink repeatedly with every press of the unlock button until they finally reach the car. They fumble inside and lock the doors behind them, and as soon as Marco has the car on, he floors it out of the parking lot. 

As he drives off, he dares a glance back and he could swear he sees a figure standing in one of the classroom windows. If Jean sees it, however, he doesn’t say anything.

Suddenly, with fear still coursing through his veins, his previous worries and concerns about his and Jean's touches are no longer a weight on his mind. Marco reaches across the center console without a thought and takes Jean’s hand in his. 

Jean, for what it’s worth, doesn’t complain. Instead, he squeezes Marco’s hand in return, laces their fingers together, and sighs a breathy sigh of relief. 

“I am _never_ letting you take me somewhere this fucked up at night _again_ ,” Jean insists with a throaty laugh. 

Marco merges onto the interstate, happily driving further and further away from the accursed elementary school, and laughs along with Jean. 

“Again, I thought you weren’t supposed to get scared, tough guy.” 

“How many times must I say that just cause I’m not afraid of ghosts doesn’t mean I’m not afraid of being murdered horribly in an abandoned elementary school?” 

Breath still a little frantic, Marco chuckles around his pants. He glances over at Jean with a smile on his face and shrugs. 

“It was still kinda fun though, you gotta admit.” 

“ _FUN_?” Jean says, “ _Fun_??? We got run out of there by a murderer.” 

“Or a ghost.” 

“Or a murderer!” 

“Or a demon…”

Jean laughs and folds himself forward, burying his face into his legs with a frenetic groan. 

“You’re a loon, Marco, an absolute madman!” 

“Maybe. But you love me,” Marco insists, his voice small all of a sudden, and perhaps not as confident as he’d intended the statement to sound. 

He expects Jean to deny it, or to ignore it, or to go stock-still and awkward as Jean had done when Marco said those same words earlier tonight at the apartment. Marco is ready for the silent denials, the persistent refusal to acknowledge whatever it is that lives between them, even after the moments they had just shared inside the school. Perhaps Jean would chalk those tender touches of his shirt, or their hand-holding as the results of fear and adrenaline in a stressful situation. 

But Jean doesn’t deny it. Nor does he stay silent. Nor does he attempt to handwave the comments. 

Instead, Jean sighs, low and slow, the breath eking out from somewhere deep within his belly, and he nods in the affirmative.

Jean’s hand squeezes Marco's with steady intent before he speaks. 

“Yeah,” Jean hums, “Yeah, I do.” 

Marco’s breath hitches in his throat and his gaze darts over to Jean in the passenger seat, lingering on him as long as he can before he has to return to the road. 

“You do?” Marco asks, bewildered, befuddled, searching for some sort of reassurance on Jean’s face. 

Jean nods again. 

“I do.” 

**::**

“Do you want me to drop you back at your dorm?” Marco whispers as they near the city center. 

Jean seems to contemplate the question for a moment, before eventually shaking his head ‘no’. 

“No... Let’s go back to yours,” Jean instructs him, “I don’t wanna... leave you alone tonight. I mean, what would you do without me to protect you, right?”

It’s a flimsy excuse, especially when Marco knows that what Jean really means is that _he_ doesn’t want to be alone or without Marco tonight. 

Marco can’t object to that. 

They ride the remaining 10 minutes back to Marco’s apartment with only the soft music from the radio as comfort; they don’t speak, but they keep their hands interlaced for the duration of the ride. Every once in a while, Jean’s thumb caresses the back of Marco’s hand - tender and warm - and the enormity of this touch is everything that has been building between them for the last decade. Jean’s fingers caressing his hand - it feels like all the times Marco has crawled up the side of Jean's house and snuck into his bedroo. It feels like all the times they were under Jean’s blankets playing Pokemon at two in the morning. It’s feels like they’ve fallen asleep on the couch together, slouched against each other after an all-night movie binge. It feels like every time Jean has held Marco when he cried about wishing his dad were still alive, or every time Marco had tended Jean’s bruises when he’d gotten into playground fights. 

With Jean’s hand wrapped around his own… it feels like Marco is home again. 

Marco parks the car at his apartment complex without a word, but neither of them move to get out, even once the car is turned off. 

They sit in silence in the parking lot for a moment, hands still clasped, with the heaviness of unspoken words lingering between them.

This is too much to bear; Marco has to speak, has to break the silence. 

“I got a two bedroom apartment on purpose, you know?” Marco says softly, “That second bedroom, it was always supposed to be yours. If you wanted it, I mean.” 

Jean ducks his head, staring down at his lap, and licks his lip. 

“Yeah. That would be good.” 

“Or even,” Marco dares, wondering if he’s about to overstep his boundaries and ruin whatever quiet understanding he and his best friend have suddenly come to, “Or we could even leave it as an office… And you could stay with me. In my room.” 

Jean doesn’t reply, and Marco is sure that he’s ruined this. 

“L-like old times, you know? Or, or… Fuck, I dunno, I’m sorry, I-” Marco stammers, trying with desperation to fix whatever the hell he just fucked up. 

“I’d like that,” Jean tells him, still staring at his lap. His fingers tighten around Marco’s and then relax. 

Jean looks up and without another word, he releases Marco’s hand and leans over the console, taking Marco’s face in both his hands, and draws him into a soft kiss. He breaks the kiss after a long, lingering moment, but doesn’t pull his face away. Instead, Jean keeps them close as a low breath shudders through his nose. When he speaks, his lips brush against Marco’s.

“Come on, let’s go on up… You can keep me safe from all the ghosts, yeah?” 

**::**

**Author's Note:**

> [rebloggable link here](https://commodorecliche.tumblr.com/post/640249155387883520/yayyyy-i-can-finally-share-my-fic-from-the) & [retweetable link here](https://twitter.com/commodorecliche/status/1349537516337197063?s=20)
> 
> I know I didn't quite hit _every_ detail of your request, but I hope you still enjoyed this, ZoeBug!!! It was a thrill to write for you and to write this prompt! 
> 
> Thank you everyone for reading! If you liked this, maybe leave me a little comment, or even just a kudos! I'd be thrilled for either, but y'all know I thrive on your feedback. 
> 
> (Also can you tell I've been playing a lot of Phasmophobia lately???) 
> 
> Come yell at me on [tumblr](https://commodorecliche.tumblr.com) or twitter.


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